


Ask Me Nothing

by maybelexa



Category: Fifth Harmony (Band)
Genre: Angst and Hurt/Comfort, F/F, Minor Character Death, Supernatural Elements
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-03-14
Updated: 2019-11-03
Packaged: 2019-11-18 02:16:53
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,524
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18111221
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/maybelexa/pseuds/maybelexa
Summary: Camila is grieving the death of her sister after a fatal car accident involving the two of them when an unexpected stranger turns up at the funeral and changes what's left of the rest of her life.





	1. Peace In A Hurricane

My sister always used to tell me, “You don’t have to feel safe to feel unafraid.” She first introduced me to the phrase when all I wanted to do was fly but was paralyzed by the giant swings looming over the playground. And again when all of our cousins were dunking and leaping over each other in the pool one humid fourth of July and I was hugging my knees to the edge of the sharp pool as my ankles waded back and forth through the cool chlorine. 

The phrase was scattered all over my life, every corner of every first step was painted with its letters and it brought a warmth to me when my bones were rattled with fears cold touch. But now as the words stumble out of the bumbling pastor's mouth they bring on a sinking feeling deep in my stomach that knocks the air straight from my lungs. I was drowning in a dark sea of grim faces and wilting lilies. Looking up to the gaping window pane of a lighthouse I prayed could pull me to the sunny shore, but the pews stood like anchors as familiar stares snaked heavy ropes around my neck. There was no escape. 

The preacher continued his speech of how the dead are gone and the wicked keep breathing or something like that I’m sure his words might have even been touching but I was too far down in the depths to listen. A flash of color caught in the corner of my eye dragging my focus away from the pews. It wasn’t bright, it wasn’t fast, in fact, it was navy in a sea of black but after being in the dark for so long you start to notice things like that. 

I make my way to the buffet table where the stranger has gathered a plate and begins picking through the assorted grieving foods. She was tall, the stranger, with long black hair that fell over her shoulder. She would have seemed average at best with a slightly oversized navy t-shirt decorated in some version of a yellow painted smiley face and Nirvana typed in large yellow letters near the hem. Her jeans were black and torn with worn maroon shoes decorated with holes where her toes must have perked up as she walked. But despite her casual demeanor, she was breathtaking. Her nose formed the perfect tip settling symmetrical between sharp cheekbones that made her seem regal, like a goddess amidst a winter storm. Her eyes were a bright shade of green that reminded me of the way sunlight shone through forest leaves onto the ground below with dark eyebrows relaxed as she pondered her selection of finger foods. 

Soon a fierce wave of anger racked my body causing my fists to ball up and push jagged fingernails into the tender flesh of my palm. The stranger didn’t even have the courtesy to seem at all dampened by the setting or burdened by the weight of a life lost. This girl was cashing in on a family’s pain yet she didn't seem particularly out of place there. In fact, it was almost difficult to imagine the girl anywhere else and I couldn’t quite place why. But this newfound fire had me rushing toward her now and there was no going back. She hadn’t even bothered to look up upon my arrival and just simply kept on picking at food from the table. 

“What do you think you’re doing here?” I hissed still rather quietly as to not disturb the pastor who was still stumbling through his speech and wetting the first row with every swipe his wist took to a sweaty brow. 

The stranger didn’t smile, didn’t blink, didn’t make any notion she had heard anything at all.

“I said wha-“ My voice began to rise at the blatant disregard for my presence before a soft low voice strangled whatever else was to follow. 

Her shoulders were relaxed with little emotion playing over her features as she calmly set down the full plate, “He sure is sweating a lot. You don’t think this is his first funeral do you?” She had turned her attention to the stage of the chapel now with a casual look of interest playing in her eyes before moving back to the table. “Judging by how many times he’s almost swallowed the mic I’d be surprised if he’d even seen a wake before today.” 

I couldn’t help but chuckle remembering the empathetic looks the pastor received as feedback tore through the otherwise mumbling atmosphere only causing him to perspire more profusely than before. 

“Do you think they receive any training for this?” I found my self asking while casting my gaze toward the stage without finding any real focus.

“Like a dress rehearsal?” The stranger mused.

“Exactly. Do you think they line up the nuns to listen to his heartwarming speech before he plugs in the persons name and addresses their loved ones?” 

This earned a throaty laugh from the stranger as she ran a hand through her dark locks causing the black waves to crash over her shoulders, “Not from what I have seen.”

“Oh? And what do you think happens?” I couldn’t quite grasp what was keeping me from kicking the girl out but I was actually enjoying her company. This had been the first time I’d had any casual conversation in what felt like a void of sympathy. 

My days have been consumed with, “we’re sorry for your loss”, and, “your sister lived a beautiful life,” or my favorite, “ it's just a miracle you’re here.” Bless you, bless you, bless you. 

“I think the senior pastor hands him a bible,” She paused, setting down her plate, and training her eyes on me with a hard expression pulling us into the role play.

“With a speech of his own on how it is, ‘Every pastor's duty to guide the living after death.’”

She deepened her voice as she gave a quite impressive interpretation of an older gentleman giving a boy the, ‘How to be a man,’ speech before continuing, “And then he re-reads his sermon over and over again until he himself is convinced of his godly duties to watch over all of the lords children,” The stranger began to trail off in thought for a moment, “only to get up on that stage, look death in the eye, and wilt just like the rest of them.” 

I mulled this over a few times before concluding that there may be a point to be made on the subject. This conclusion was brought by a brief moment of contentment before coming back to a single thought, “Why are you here?”

The stranger smiled with fondness as a spark of something bolted through the blazing field of green resting in her eyes before her expression relaxed into a small smile that stretched her soft pink lips, “I’m waiting for a friend.”

This only made my brow furrow further as I studied her. The plate was long forgotten, sitting clean and empty next to the others as if no food had stained its surface. I brought my attention up to her face just as she turned her focus. Her eyes cut through me like a blade and for a moment I was lost in a familiar place. 

The stranger began to take a few steps back before turning to walk away. Despite the ice running through my veins, I found the courage to move, to follow. The stranger began to float straight through the grieving party with no motion to weave as I struggled to push through but they clung like thick moss to my skin and that I couldn’t wade through. After finally swimming free of the crowd I barreled through a large oak door with frightening ease and stumbled out into the shaded cemetery. 

The grass was a lush dark green that painted the church grounds with large oaks reaching out of its strokes. Another flash of color this time brighter had me sprinting further and further into the yard. The trees seemed to collect with more intensity, blocking out any of the suns rays from kissing the green blades as the shadows grew colder. 

A spotlight had my heals struggling to find balance as I slid across the grassy carpet to the edge of the shadow. In the middle stood the stranger now decorated in a dark sleeveless hood that allowed her dark bangs to peak through the hem while shielding the rest of her features with its shadows. With the absence of worn sneakers came dark grey boots fit for a warrior trudging days through the forest with nothing but a sword. 

In replacement of the noble weapon, one might have theorized was a large scythe being help upright, it's thick naturally polished wood laying firmly in the girls grasp. Her right arm was painted with dark ink branching across the pale skin that traveled down to her fingers and grew up around her neck disappearing into the shadows of her bangs yet never swaying to the left of her nose.

But that wasn’t quite what had my breath caking onto the pink walls of my lungs like mud. A couple of feet across from the stranger in the center of the break in the woven branches stood a girl with blood and ash collected in the crevices of her smile. Her familiar dark hair and warm chocolate eyes sent me stumbling again now into the light. 

My sister's image was masked with deep cuts all over her face and neck and arms, the rest of the skin covered in dirt or dark purple bruises, but still, she smiled at me with that same wide grin that always broke through the chaos of day to day life. Tears began to fall down my cheeks and I can’t seem to do anything else but stand and stare and let her assure me with those silent eyes, but of what I couldn’t be certain. 

Slowly the gashes above her eyes and neck began to fade and she turned her attention back to the stranger I had somehow forgotten all about. As the wounds seemed to stitch themselves together I could only gasp and ignore the tears now slipping freely down my cheeks an action that I had assumed before now had been lost to the mangled metal still scattered on the edge of the highway. I finally follow my sisters gaze to the stranger who could only be an angel at this point I assume. 

But if the stranger was an angel then the bible had it all wrong. My gaze drifted to the girl now standing tall with a blank expression settled onto her sharp features. Slowly large gashes began to appear first over her brow and then down her neck followed by more and more until my sister was clean and the spirit was drenched in blood and dirt. Nothing gave the idea the stranger could be in pain besides the ghostly white color covering her knuckles as her grip on the weapon tightened as if she let go all reality would be lost. The inked branches that reached across her features seemed to constrict and rustle as if a storm was making its way across her skin.

And then she looked at me again, her knuckles relaxed, her eyes were calm as the leaves floating lazily to the forest floor at the start of fall. The crash still covered her face and she smiled through the ash, “You don’t have to feel safe, to feel unafraid.” 

I looked desperately to my sister who only nodded and smiled.

I wanted to scream at her not to leave without really knowing how I knew she was going anywhere in the first place. But this felt like goodbye and all I wanted to do was grab her arm and drag her into that church and scream at everyone, “No! Stop your crying! She’s here! She’s here! She’s right here!” 

But the only words I could choke out of my mouth were, “I love you.”

And somehow I knew she couldn't say anything back. That deaths bliss had rendered her speechless and the stranger's words were her sisters last. Her last reminder not to be afraid of living. Not to be afraid of loving. Not to be afraid of anything. And just like that in a blink, they were gone. 

The clouds parted and the sun broke through the rest of the cemeteries forest. Leaving streams of light to dance along the dark green blades and for the first time in a long time, I felt peace in a hurricane.


	2. Neon Moon

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is going to pick up next chapter! Thank you for the patience between chapters I wasn't sure how to continue this at first.

Peace is a funny thing.

 

It lingers for a few fleeting moments before reality slowly seeps in like a single drop of water from a crack in the ceiling turns into a crashing stream breaking down the strongest walls.

 

I swirled the short glass in front of me and allow myself to get lost in thought staring at its caramel colored liquid.

 

Since the funeral I’ve continuously found myself in the same bar sitting on the same stool that rocked from side to side when I adjusted my hips. The exposed brick behind the bar riddled with dark stains from years of bottles and people being thrown against it in drunken altercations while the counter is scored with key drawn pictures of penises and declarations of a one night love.

 

“Camila? Camila!” The raspy voice cut through my thoughts, “Have you been listening? I’m worried about you…”

 

The truth is I absolutely have not been listening. I couldn’t hear anything. Voices and songs and sounds all blended together into a low hum in the back of my mind. The only thing of importance is a loop of the strangers voice playing over and over again in my ears like she’s right next to me again.

 

Dinah adjusted uncomfortably in her seat causing the metal legs to screech against the floor like nails on a chalkboard, “I don’t know why you insist on coming here. Its disgusting.”

 

The ancient looking bar tender paused slightly as he dries a glass between his tattooed hands and shot her a sideways glare.

 

She lowered her voice, “And not to mention the people… this just isn’t really your scene Camilla.”

 

I knocked back the rest of the scotch and slid it to the edge of the bar. I liked the simplicity here. I finished the drink, he filled the drink, nothing less and nothing more.

 

“And what is my scene?” The words felt foreign, like they were stumbling out of someone else’s mouth.

 

Dinah took this brief break in silence as permission to remind me of all the things I’ve been missing from my old life, “You need to be somewhere vibrant! Somewhere fun like the Wonderbar where we could take cute instagram photos or that little cafe on the square you like to read at so much. I don’t know Camz somewhere with a little light at least maybe a window or two.”

 

The bartender splashed more of the liquid into my glass and slid it back into my hands like we rehearsed yesterday and the day before and every day since. She wasn’t wrong. I had never been here before I walked out of the grave yard. I had walked and walked and walked until the fences became jagged rather than polished and pained. The sidewalk became more and more scarred with cracks and canyons. The sun had fallen under the horizon and I saw this place with its blinking neon sign wedged between a crumbling building and a tattoo shop. Something about the bullet holes in the door and the bars on the broken windows felt charming in a death wish sort of way.

 

Dinah let out a sigh mingled with disappointment and worry, “Come on, its getting late lets get out of here.”

 

She dismounted her stool and gathered her bag over her shoulder. She looked at me expectantly, desperately, but I couldn’t move. I couldn’t think of a single place to go. So Dinah glanced at the bar tender who gave her a curt nod and then settled her eyes on me once more.

 

“Its been three months Camila, we miss you.” Her hand hovered over my shoulder briefly as if the slightest touch could shatter me before the sharp clack of her heels echoed through the bar and the door swung closed.

 

This isn’t the first time one of my friends has come to fetch me. Tried to drag me back out into the open where the world could see my scars and people could dote and ravish me with sympathy. They try to paint the silver lining, lean on the gift of life. After all its a miracle right?

 

But this was no miracle.

 

“She’s right ya know.” I snapped my head up from my glass and made steady eye contact with the bartender. His voice was rough and deep like the bottom of a drum, “You can’t stay here.”

 

A laugh formed somewhere in the back of my through that surfaced as a scoff, “Are you kicking me out?”

 

He shook his head and braced his hands on the edge of the bar, the rippled rose on the surface of his skin catching the light, “You can hide out as long as you like, but you won’t find her here.”

 

Her. The word sliced through my chest and let all the air right out of my lungs. I opened my mouth but the question was caught in my throat. Held down by an invisible force as I worked my jaw.

 

He stood back up right and grabbed another glass looking pointedly at the scar on my neck, “Death leaves her mark on all of us. One way or another.”

 

Another voice sounded from the other end of the bar and he nodded once more before walking away.

 

She was real. I saw her. He saw her. I think he saw her? He knows her or of her which means I couldn’t have made it up. The phantom whispering in my ear was somewhere and I was going to find her.

 

I slammed back the full glass and threw it on the counter before my foot slipped off the rod of the stool and sent me crashing to the floor, but the pain never registered. Neither did the voices of concern or the burst of cold wind that slapped the daze from my eyes as I burst through the door. I started running, cat calls whistled by from men stumbling home, cars streaked in blurs of lights and horns, and my lungs strained as each gulp of icy air ripped through them.

 

I ran until I stood in front of tall gothic iron gates. They loomed over the cemetery as their shadows cast by the full moon stretched over polished graves. My fingers closed around the cold metal and gave a firm tug that rattled the chains holding them tightly closed.

 

The noise sent a jolt through my body and I quickly looked around to see if anyone lingered near by but the sidewalk was empty and the street bare. I put my foot on one of the iron waves that decorated the gate and gave it a pressure test before hoisting myself up. I reached the top with only a few minor slips before tumbling over the edge and landing with loud thud on the frozen grass.

 

I blink a couple times as the air slowly made its way inside my lungs and the ringing in my ears subsided. A blurry image of long slender legs standing among the head stones danced in my vision and I raced to my feet.

 

The world wouldn’t stop spinning but I could still see her silhouette weaving through the graves. I stumbled and braced myself on trees and crumbling headstones trying to keep up until I felt my foot slipping under a root and I fell to my knees.

 

I tried to find my footing again but the slick grass wouldn’t let me up. The cold faded marble propped up my head and seeped into the sweater that covered my shoulders. A sticky warm feeling made its way down my temple. I winced as my finger tips grazed the wound and came back covered in a bright red wetness. My eyes quickly became impossibly heavy as the alcohol thinned the blood in my veins and dulled my nerves.

 

Emerging out of the shadows I saw her walk slowly toward me. Her image getting closer every time I managed to open my eyes. With slow breaths I tried to stay, to stay awake, to stay there. She crouched down and the smell of lavender filled my senses. She reached up running her fingers over the wound and through my hair.

 

I couldn’t tell what lay in her eyes as they searched my face but a calmness washed over me and a smile pulled at the corners of my lips as I closed my eyes one last time.


End file.
